Week 2

 

Monday:  Martin Luther King Jr. Day -  No Class

                        - go to www.americanrhetoric.com to see and hear some of Dr. King’s most famous speeches

 

Wednesday:   Quiz on Film:  Cities of the Pharaohs

 

Friday:  continuing Mesopotamia in Lecture, evaluated primary source Law Code of Hammurabi (pg. 9 in text) in class

 

Ancient Mesopotamia                  

I.                    Defining Early Civilizations

A.     Complex social structure (power hierarchy, classes)

B.    Complex political structure (government)

II.                  Geography of Mesopotamia

III.                Technology – early writing systems

IV.               Sumerian City-States

V.                 The Kingdom of Babylonia

 

Important Terms:

            Tigris and Euphrates                                    City-states

            Tablet-house                                                  Scribes          

            Artisans                                                          Pictographs

            Cuneiform writing (“wedge-shaped”)          Ziggurat

            Epic of Gilgamesh – explains city-states, kingship, religion and gods, afterlife

           

 

In-Class Evaluation of Hammurabi’s Law Code:

            When was it written?  -  c. 1750 BCE

            What type of document?  -  law code

            Where did it come from?  -  Mesopotamia

            Who wrote it?   -  Hammurabi  (with help from Shamash, the Sun God)

 

            What does our excerpt say?  -  It addresses crimes and punishments regarding marriage issues, adultery, contracts, personal property, bodily injury, and harm of pregnant women.   It is a law of retribution – “eye for an eye.”  Punishments are harsh. 

 

            What are some values of this culture?  -  They seem to value men over women, the rich over the poor, women in childbearing years, contracts, and the gods.  The law is simple, yet serious.

 

            What does this source tell us?  -   This is a culture interested in justice, even for those of lesser status.  This culture has a hierarchy – a nobleman, commoner, and slave all have different values.  Women have some rights, but mainly through their relationships to men, either husbands or fathers. 

 

            Hidden evidence?  - Literacy for some (Cuneiform), access to the law for most.  Because the law came from the gods it could not be changed or altered in any way, it maintained order.  Despite harshness of punishments the code suggests a very advanced and intricate society.